Jokowi's Brother-In-Law Implicated in Lulu Group Tax Bribery Case
Jakarta. The Corruption Eradication Commission, or KPK, said late on Tuesday (14/02) that a brother-in-law of President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo has been implicated in a recent tax bribery case involving the Abu Dhabi-based Lulu Group International.
Arif Budi Sulistyo, Jokowi's brother-in-law and the operation director of the president's furniture firm Rakabu Sejahtera, allegedly helped Ramapanicker Rajamohanan Nair, the director of E.K. Prima Exports Indonesia — a local division of Lulu Group, to meet with the director general of taxes Ken Dwijugiasteadi and the head of the Jakarta regional tax office Muhammad Haniv in September 2016.
The order of the meeting was to fix E.K. Prima's $5.7 million back taxes, KPK spokesman Febri Diansyah said.
Nair was arrested in a KPK sting operation in November along with Handang Soekarno, head of initial evidence in the law enforcement directorate at the Finance Ministry's tax directorate general.
The two were caught with $148,500 in their possession, allegedly part of a total of $445,000 in bribes promised to Handang.
Both Nair and Handang have been named suspects in the bribery case.
"Arief Budi Sulistyo has a major role in this chain of events as the defendant's business partner. He was the one who knows the officials at the directorate general of taxes," Febri said.
Febri said on Sept. 22, 2016, Haniv had met Handang to tell him that Arif had sought an audience with Ken, according to an indictment read by KPK prosecutors at the Corruption Court in Jakarta on Monday.
On Sep 23, Handang brought Arif to meet Ken at the Tax Office headquarters in Jakarta, and not long after this meeting, the tax office wrote off E.K. Prima's Rp 52.3 billion ($3.9 million) tax liabilities for the 2014 fiscal year and Rp 26.4 billion for the fiscal period up to December 2015.
Febri said KPK investigators had already questioned Arif in January but only revealed his alleged involvement in court because the investigators did not want their investigation to be distracted by unwanted publicity.
The KPK did let the public know that Ken has been summoned as a witness in the case. At the time, Ken denied that the Tax Office could write off the tax charges so easily.
The bribery case, especially since it implicated senior officials, came as a shock to the tax office and Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati, who since her first stint as finance minister in 2005 has been pushing a relatively successful initiative against corruption in the tax and customs offices.
In December, the minister formed two teams to oversee reforms in Indonesia's tax and customs and excise offices and restore public trust in the institutions.
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